The other day I sat enamored at an amazing sunset begging me to remember a prayer once prayed over my husband and me. It was like a love letter from the Lord. Though no words flashed across the sky, there was clearly a message in this beauty.

My mind was drawn back many years. Seventeen years ago, December 5, 1992, a young couple stood at the altar having no clue what the vows they nervously repeated meant.

"To have and to hold from this day forward"… it was just what the pastor said so they repeated it back in a clueless kind of way.

They felt in love. A giddy kind of electric current drew them together. They liked what they got from each other. It just felt right.

Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and talk to my younger self who was dawning a veil about to prance down the aisle.  I would caution that bride girl that you don't feel your way into real love.

You choose your way into real love. I would tell her to look at the verses of 1 Corinthians 13 and not see it as a wish list of how she felt entitled to be treated by her groom. Rather, see it is a list of choices they each must make.

Instead of reading it, "Your love should be kind and patient and not keep a record of wrongs."

I would tell her they must make the choice instead to say… "We are making the decision that our love will be kind. We will work toward making our love patient. And we will choose not to keep a record of wrongs."

I would tell her to especially listen to the words of the prayer that Art's Dad prayed over us during the ceremony. In one part of the prayer Mr. TerKeurst said, "And then when the sun is setting and the years have gone by, may this couple be found then as now standing together, still hand in hand, still thanking God for each other." 

Something about that sunset the other night brought all this to my mind and made my breath catch in my throat. For I suddenly remembered that wedding day prayer and I must admit I felt convicted.

Somehow in the craziness of life's schedule, I couldn't remember the last time we just took time to hold hands and talk about us. Not our teenager's choices, or the broken down car, or why there were so many weeds last summer, or how did your meeting go today, or did you return that video back to the store… not that kind of conversation. No, I mean the kind of conversation that seems harder and harder to find time for in the midst of life.

The kind of conversation that we are overdue for is the kind we’ll remember, treasure, and hold on to. For another day will surely come where these conversations will be the sweetest of all our memories. The day when the sun sets on our lives and one of us will lay the other in the arms of Jesus…may it be that we laughed and talked and freely forgave and never stopped holding hands.

If you happen to be in a tough spot with your marriage, I’d love to pray for you.  Art and I have walked through some deep valleys and would consider it an honor to ask the Lord to help give you wisdom and courage during this time.  Feel free to post anonymously if need be.

Or if you're not married yet, I'd love to pray for your hopes and dreams for the future.

And if you and your husband have found some creative communication ideas that work for you, please share.  I’d love to hear how you and your husband intentionally create the love story you long to live.

by Lysa TerKeurst

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Lysa is the author of 13 books including her best selling set for husbands and wives called,